What is my IP address?

How this tool actually works

Most "what is my IP" sites route your request through their own server, log it, and sometimes call a paid third-party geolocation API before showing you an answer. This site works differently: it runs on Cloudflare's edge network, and Cloudflare already attaches your IP address, your network's registered owner and an approximate location to every request that reaches any of its 300+ data centers worldwide, for security and routing purposes, whether or not a website chooses to display it. We simply read those values back to you and render them, in the same request, at whichever Cloudflare location is physically closest to you. That's why the page loads in milliseconds: there's no separate network round trip to a geolocation service, no database write, and no server-side log entry tying the result to you.

IPv4 vs. IPv6: why you might see two different addresses

Every device connected to the internet needs an address, the same way every house needs a street address for mail to find it. There are two address systems in use today, and most home and mobile networks now use a mix of both:

• IPv4 looks like 203.0.113.42, four numbers separated by dots. It's the older system, and because there are only about 4.3 billion possible IPv4 addresses, most home connections share one address between many devices (via a technique called NAT).
• IPv6 looks like 2001:0db8:85a3::8a2e:0370:7334, longer, written in hexadecimal and separated by colons. It was designed because IPv4 was running out, and gives every device its own globally unique address without needing to share.

Your browser and operating system decide, connection by connection, which version to use, so it's normal to see IPv4 in one app and IPv6 in another, or only one of the two if your ISP hasn't rolled out IPv6 support yet. Read our full what is an IP address guide for the longer explanation, including private vs. public and static vs. dynamic addresses.

Why does my IP address show a different city than I'm in?

The location shown above is approximate: it comes from a database that maps IP address ranges to the city, region and country where your internet provider registered that range, not from your device's GPS. A few things commonly cause the location to look off:

• Your internet provider may route traffic through a regional hub in a nearby city before it reaches you, so the address range is registered there instead of your actual town.
• Mobile connections (4G/5G) are especially imprecise. Carriers often show the location of a regional gateway rather than your phone's actual position, sometimes hundreds of kilometres away.
• If you're connected to a VPN, this location is the VPN server's location, not yours. See the dedicated VPN section below for how to use that to check your VPN is actually working.

What your internet provider (ISP) field means

The internet provider value above comes from your IP address's registered Autonomous System (AS) number, a public registry entry that says which company or organization was allocated that block of addresses. For a home connection this is usually your ISP by name (e.g. Comcast, AT&T, BT, Vodafone); on a work, university or mobile network it may show the organization or a regional subsidiary instead. It's a completely public, non-sensitive piece of routing information, the same data any website you visit can already see about every request you make.

Using this tool to check your VPN

A VPN (virtual private network) reroutes your traffic through a server it operates, so websites see the VPN server's IP address and location instead of yours. That makes this page a quick, reliable way to confirm a VPN connection is actually doing its job:

• Load this page BEFORE connecting your VPN and note your IP address and approximate location.
• Connect your VPN, then reload this page (the Refresh button above works, or hit your browser's reload).
• If the VPN is working, both the IP address and the location should now be different, typically matching whichever VPN server location you selected, not your real one.
• If they're unchanged, the VPN isn't routing this traffic. Common causes: a "split tunnel" setting that excludes your browser, a VPN app that silently disconnected, or a browser-only VPN extension that doesn't cover the whole device.
• For an extra check, look at the internet provider field too: it should switch from your home ISP's name to the VPN provider's own hosting or network name once connected.

IP address vs. port, hostname and MAC address: terms that get mixed up

A few related terms often get lumped in with "IP address". Here's how each one is actually different:

• Port: a number (like :443 for HTTPS) that identifies which specific service on a device a connection is for, the way an apartment number narrows down a street address to one door. Your IP address is the building; the port is the apartment.
• Hostname / domain name: a human-readable name (like example.com) that the Domain Name System translates into an IP address behind the scenes, so people don't have to memorize numbers.
• MAC address: a fixed identifier burned into a device's network hardware at the factory. Unlike your IP address, it never changes and is never sent to websites; it only matters on your local network (see the FAQ below).
• Hostname of your device (e.g. "Armins-MacBook"): a name your own computer or router uses to refer to your device on the local network, unrelated to, and never derived from, your public IP address.

What can, and can't, someone actually do with your IP address

Your IP address gets a reputation for being more sensitive than it actually is. Here's a realistic breakdown:

• Can: tell a website roughly which city or region you're browsing from (used for currency, language or shipping defaults), tell your ISP which of its own customers was assigned an address at a given time, and let a determined attacker attempt to overload it with traffic if they already have a specific reason to target you (a denial-of-service attempt), though this targets the address itself, not your files or accounts.
• Can't: reveal your name, home address, phone number, or any account credentials on its own; let a stranger "hack into your computer" just by knowing the number; or be used to directly read your private messages or files. Those all require a completely different kind of access than an IP address provides.